Tag Archives: cat lady

In my mind Not Yoga is its own genre in the blogosphere. I have a friend who just discussed wanting to write in the Not Yoga genre, though the Yoga genre is also nice. Her idea got me thinking. Of course I like to write about yoga, but when ya’ll aren’t looking I also write about Not Yoga. I do longhand writing practice to stir up ideas and muddy the waters in my mind so it’ll eventually run clear. I work on my novel.

I had a wing-back chair about ten years ago, but it was actually my writing chair. It was the color of dandelion petals with a broad back like every girls’ first crush. This chair sat on graceful wooden legs and had a nice thick cushion. There were tiny scratch marks that ran vertically on both armrests from my cats gaining purchase when they tried to join me in my work.

This was the era of Pixie and Merry Weather. Those two cats watched me finish two novels, a collection of short stories and no few poems. Pixie was a black Manx with a personality disorder who I love dearly. She had green eyes set in her wide fluffy face. She was missing one fang from the time she attacked the bulldog. I called her Rambo because she drew first blood.

Merry Weather was the softest being I ever felt. She had an aura like golden cashmere draped across my arms. Her fur had a downy quality that billowed in the softest exhalation near her body. Her blue eyes stared like topaz excavated from a King’s tomb. She was beautiful and sweet and ancient when she died. I still miss her.

I miss that damn yellow chair, too. During a move nearly nine years ago my writing chair got put in the back of the garage. It ended up in the we’ll do something with this later pile. I was at work and so couldn’t tell anyone to put it in my room, for heaven’s sake, if I were ever to get any work done.

It is unfortunate that the we’ll do something with this later pile was in the back of the garage. Nothing ever got done with it. A year and a half ago we moved out of that house and that chair didn’t make it out alive. There was something in the way the thick cushion was discolored in such a way that prevented me from wanting to sit on it. There was a smell that prevented me from being able to really lean back into it or want to go near it.

I have made due. I didn’t really think I missed that chair except for when it came up in a memory during which I was thinking of someone or something else. I have been able to get work done since that chair and I parted ways. In fact, I began working on the floor at a table made just for little ‘ole me. It was measured to the perfect height for writing practice on the floor. It is also the perfect height for me to use as a tea table during meditation practice.

Last night there were tornadoes in my area. Living in the south, I’m not really sure what you call what happened here last night. I know hurricanes and squalls and thunder storms like nobody’s business. Tornadoes are something entirely different.

Not one born with strong nerves to begin with, after looking at the weather radar the night before these storms hit I cleared sitting space in a walk-in closet for me, the cats and my mom’s rotten little dog (mom is safely in Colorado for the week, skiing the slopes). The new cat contingent is remarkable, I should add, though they are unseasoned as far as writer cats go. They have not seen me complete one long work of fiction, though to their credit they’ve watched me finish more than a few malas.

The storms started whipping the skies with noise like a bad metal band. We were in the front room when these new sounds started, and so me, the cats – and my little dog, too – move into the back of the house. I’m not really ready to sit in the closet. It doesn’t feel like closet weather yet.

I have enough books and writing materials to keep me busy for the better part of next week but I do not know where to sit with it all. I do not want to get in bed as the headboard is in front of a large window. I do not want to get in the tub, the curve is terrible on the lumbar spine. I don’t want to sit on the floor yet because I already do plenty of that.

Alas, there is a wing-back chair beside the door that is now closed. I do not know from whence this chair comes as it is one of my mother’s salvage finds. It is pink with a moderately broad back, little wooden legs and a comfortable seat. I cover it with a flannel fitted sheet with a Christmas pattern on it.

I sit down. I have my security blanket (you know you have one, too) and a large book on my lap. I cross my legs and settle in just like I have always had a wing-back chair to catch me when I fall. I nestle to the right, just a bit, so my shoulder blade presses against the corner like a hen settling comfortably in her roost.

For a moment I forget the howling wind and remember every time I sat in my favorite chair. The memory floods my mind in an instant as though that entire part of my life flashes before my eyes.

When the tornadoes did everything terrible they came to do and I retired to my own room my current working chair hurt my back a little more than usual. It felt a little too high and a little too narrow. The cushion was less forgiving and the word count goal for the day was hard won.

That wing-back chair is in my room now. It’s on loan until I find one for myself. I’m sitting in it right now, in fact, composing this endless missive to you. I am leaning just a bit to the right with my legs crossed like Aladdin riding his magic carpet.

Earlier when I said that I was going to write in the Not Yoga genre I lied a little bit. I have to sneak a little bit in here at the end because it fits so nicely. You see, since one’s seat is so important we’re going to be talking about it tomorrow in both of my classes. Of course, I’ll be talking about sitting in meditation, where the magic happens. I hope you can make it.

As for now, I’m going to try to make magic of a different sort happen, the sort that dreams are made of – hard won word counts and wild ideas.